Cottage Neighbours
by velllichor
Summary: If I'd known a certain messy haired idiot was going to be staying in the cottage next to my family's when we went away for winter holidays, I would've stayed at Hogwarts
1. Christmas Holidays

"Lily I can't believe you're actually going away for Christmas this year," Dorcas whined from where she was sprawled out on her bed, her head hanging upside down. I gave a sigh of regret and finished folding the last of my sweaters into my trunk.

"I know, I know, I really wasn't planning on it," I sighed as I closed the lid of my trunk with a loud click. I gave a tug at the handle and steadied myself as the trunk flew off my bed and swung through the air before I managed to set it down on the floor.

"It's your last year, why on earth would they make you spend it with Petunia in a cabin in the middle of the woods?" Dorcas asked, she rolled over and planted her chin into her cupped hands, frown still in place.

"It's supposed to be family bonding time to strengthen our relationships, and hope for a miracle to strike and for Petunia to stop hating my existence," I said running a hand through my hair. "She might very well murder me and bury my body somewhere in the woods."

"I wish I could at least come," Dorcas said.

"I mean I would let you except you can't behave yourself around Petunia and I don't plan on being at war with her the entire time that I'm there," I said, giving Dorcas a knowing look.

"Good grief, so I got into one fight with her one time and suddenly I can't behave myself," Dorcas said with frustration. I couldn't help but grin back at her.

"Let me just refresh your memory, Petunia's hair was so tangled they couldn't even untangle it at the salon so she had to chop it all off, her room was half destroyed, half of my clothes went missing, and she was ready to start throwing knives before mum walked in," I said with a raised eyebrow.

"Okay fine, but if she does anything too out of line, send an owl and I will bring my fury down on her and teach her a lesson," Dorcas replied. She swung her legs around and hopped off the bed. I shrugged on my jacket and wrapped my scarf around my neck securely. My mittens and my hat in one hand, the other holding my wand as I levitated my trunk down the stairs. Dorcas closed the door to our dorm with a quiet click before hurrying to catch up with me down the stairs.

"You're not going to wear your cloak?" Dorcas asked as we made our way through the empty Gryffindor common room and out of the portrait hole.

"Are you kidding me, Petunia would leave the minute I showed up looking even mildly magical and then who would I have to take me home," I said with a snort and a shake of my head. Dorcas huffed from next to me.

"Your sister is honestly so ridiculous about the smallest things, like you would rather be cold than use a cloak to keep yourself warm," Dorcas said as we descended down a set of stairs. We stopped and waited as the stairs started moving with a lurch, hands on the rails to keep our balance.

"I know, but it's a small thing to do so I honestly don't really mind. It's the big things that I can't help that she has a real problem with," I said with a sigh. The stairs finally stopped moving and we continued down, we took another set of stairs to get back onto the original path we were on before the stairs had moved us to.

"I heard James and Sirius left for the winter holidays a couple of days ago," Dorcas said nonchalantly. I kept looking forward, acting like I totally couldn't see her trying to look at me out of the corner of her eye. Ever since the start of the year, Dorcas had been dropping hints about James, or James and I constantly after finding out that we were both Head Boy and Girl. I didn't know who's agenda she was pushing but I had a sneaking suspicion that she and Sirius were up to no good planning something.

"That's great, they can finally start misbehaving after all of these months of inactivity," I replied with a grin.

"That's true, I'm surprised they managed to stay out of trouble for this long," Dorcas said. "But anyways, don't you want to know where they went?"

"No, not really, as it probably won't have any influence on me anyways," I replied but of course Dorcas acted as if I had said the exact opposite and started talking over top of me.

"I'm so glad you have such interest, because as a matter of fact, James and Sirius are also off to stay at a cabin that James's parents own, isn't that funny," Dorcas said loudly, as she spun around and continued walking backgrounds without missing a beat.

I picked up my pace and flicked her on the forehead before speeding past her. Dorcas spun herself around and hurried to catch up with me as I turned down an empty corridor. "There are plenty of places to rent cabins in the United Kingdom, Dorcas," I said as we passed by a painting that started yelling obscenities at us.

"Oh piss off!" Dorcas yelled at the painting and turned her attention back to me with a huff. "I keep forgetting that painting is here, it's bloody annoying being hollered at when I'm running late for class. Anyways, wouldn't it be so romantic if you two ended up staying near each other?"

I rolled my eyes as we turned down another corridor, went down the stairs, and the doors to the Great Hall came into view.

"No Dorcas, it would not be romantic, it would probably be extremely awkward, and painful, not to mention unlikely, all this land, and you think James and Sirius are going to end being in a cabin near mine," I said with a roll of my eyes. The Great Hall was full of students eating breakfast, trunks were sitting next students on the bench, or behind them blocking aisle space.

I found the closest empty space at the Gryffindor table, grabbed a bagel, buttered it as quickly as possible and then headed back towards the exit, Dorcas in tow.

"Oh come on Lily, it would be so cute, the two of you would get to spend all of your time together, get to know more about each other outside of a school setting. Even Sirius isn't that bad once you get to know him, and as a bonus, it would piss off your sister immensely," Dorcas added with a wide grin at me. It was taking all of the effort that I had to keep the corners of my mouth from spreading into a smile. But Dorcas caught them twitching anyways and shoved a finger in my face with an "AHA!"

It would be hilarious to see Petunia's eyes bug out of her head once she realized that James and Sirius were both wizards. Especially after she no doubt tried to flirt with Sirius.

"I never thought I would see the day when you would be singing the praises of Sirius Black of all people," I said as we stepped out of the castle doors and into a foot of snow. The minute we stepped outside, a light wind started to blow around us, sending a shiver through my shoulders as my body heat seeped out of me. Dorcas had her own warm cloak wrapped around her and gave a twirl to rub in my face the fact that I was sacrificing warmth to make my sister happy.

Within minutes, the hand holding my bagel was frozen, I shoved my bagel into my mouth as quickly as I possibly could to free up my hand so I could warm it up in my mittens.

"I have never hated Sirius Black, that was all you, I was just being supportive," Dorcas said as we headed towards one of the horseless carriages that would take us to the train station. Dorcas had spent days asking why I wouldn't just apparate to London, but I had no idea where I would apparate to that would keep me out of sight from muggles. Once we were seated inside one of the carriages, my trunk secured by my feet, the carriage gave a jerk and then began to move in the direction of Hogsmeade Station.

I turned back to Dorcas as the wind picked up and blew my hair into my face. I tucked as much of it behind my ear as I could before saying, "Please don't tell me that I've been keeping you from hanging out with Sirius."

My stomach clenched with guilt as it occurred to me that if Dorcas got along with Sirius, then the only reason why she hadn't hung out with him all these years, was because I found him so incredibly annoying.

"Don't worry Lils, it's not as if Sirius and I are best friends or anything, and besides I hang out with him lots," Dorcas said, her ponytail had blown over one of her shoulders, her nose slowly turning red from the cold wind.

"When do you hang out with him?" I asked. The carriage gave a bump that sent me flying into the air for a second before settling back into its smooth rhythm. I held onto my seat as my heartbeat picked up before settling back down.

"Whenever you're busy doing whatever it is you do when you're not around," Dorcas said with a shrug. "He's really not as bad as you think he is."

"I don't think Sirius is a bad person, he was just so fucking annoying when we were younger, but I don't mind him as much anymore," I said as the carriage slowed down and came to a stop in a line of other carriages, all of them carrying students waiting to get on the train heading back to London.

"Mhmm, and your opinion of James has raised quite a bit as well I can see," Dorcas said with a wiggle of her eyebrows. I couldn't help the blush that rose to my face, Lately, I seemed to have been doing quite a lot of that whenever James was brought up. Dorcas, bless her heart, had picked up on it and took any chance that she could to make me turn as red as a tomato.

Sometimes she did this around James.

Do you know how awkward it is to explain to James why you're suddenly looking as if your head is about to explode just because your dear dear friend Dorcas has mentioned that you like James. Thank Merlin James never thought of it as anything other than friendly affection. Not that it was anything other than friendly affection,so I didn't really have anything to hide now did I?

"Yes, well, his pranks are actually funny now, instead of embarrassing some poor sod in front of the entire student body, he's stopped picking on people, and he did such a good job of being Quidditch captain that Dumbledore made him Head Boy," I said with a sniff and looked forwards as the carriages slowly emptied of students.

"You're telling me that you paid enough attention to Quidditch that you noticed that James did a good job," Dorcas said, planting her elbows on her knees as she leaned forward. I didn't like where this conversation was going, if Dorcas kept poking at this topic, I was going to say something, she was going to end up twisting my words, and I was going to wind up wanting to die from embarrassment.

"They won the House Cup, it wasn't a big leap to make Dorcas, come on now, I'm not an idiot," I said. The carriage before us moved forwards and the students in it got off before it rolled away, back towards Hogwarts. My carriage moved forward before coming to a halt. Dorcas stepped down first and helped the small door open for me as I leapt out and levitated my trunk with me.

"If that's what you want to keep telling yourself then go ahead," Dorcas said, and then she grinned mischievously at me, before declaring loudly enough for several people to hear, "I'm just surprised you noticed how well James did considering your eyes were glued to his arse all of last year."

I slipped and almost slammed my forehead into my own trunk out of shock. The people that were hanging out of their compartment windows looking around snickered at my misfortune as I clapped a hand over Dorcas's mouth.

"You can't just go around saying things like that, what if somebody hears it and tells him," I hissed at Dorcas. She licked my hand and burst out laughing as I yanked it back with a loud squeal and frantically wiped it on my pants.

"At least you're not denying it," Dorcas said with a smirk as we boarded the train. We walked down the cramped hallway, looking into every window that we passed until we found an empty compartment. Dorcas waited until my trunk had been stashed overhead and we were properly seated before she started in on me again.

"I don't know what you and Sirius are planning but I've got my eye on you, I do not like James Potter as anything more than a friend, so you two can stop playing matchmaker," I told her from my spot against the window.

"I didn't say anything about having any romantic interest in James, you came there on your own," she said, and I gave a sigh of frustration. As if everything that she was implying hadn't been pointing in that direction at all. Thankfully, the Hogwarts Express let out a long whistle, and I used that as my cue to shove Dorcas out of the door and send her packing off of the train. She jumped outside and turned to face me as I stood in the doorway.

"But I'm telling you Lily, wouldn't it just be great if you and James were staying in cabins that were near each other during the holidays. Maybe if you spent some time with James, you would finally come out of your denial and snog him senseless like we all know you want to," Dorcas said. I rolled my eyes at her and shook my head.

"I spend plenty of time with James, what do you think we do for Head duties. Besides, what are even the odds that out of all of the places James and I could be vacationing, we would end up in the same place together," I said with a laugh at her.

"Would you like me to do the actual calculations for that?" Dorcas asked with a raised eyebrow, I was about to say no when she added, "Because I can owl you my work if you really wanted to know what the odds were."

"If you get that bored during the holidays, then sure, go ahead and owl me your work. I'm sure Petunia will just be ecstatic to check it for any mistakes," I said with a laugh. It would probably be the only thing even approaching normal that I would be able to talk to Petunia about.

"Just a heads up Lily, it's a lot likelier than you think it is," Dorcas said innocently. The smile was instantly wiped from my face as I narrowed my eyes at her.

"Dorcas what did you do?" I demanded loudly as another whistle pierced the air. There was a last minute rush of students onto the cart that flattened me against the wall but my gaze never wavered from Dorcas's. She had a particularly devious look on her face, her lips pursed in a way that said she was hiding something from me.

"Have a nice holiday Lily, I'll see you when you get back," Dorcas yelled back with a wave of her arm and then she turned and walked back towards an empty carriage that was about to leave for Hogwarts.

"DORCAS WHAT DID YOU DO?!" I hollered at her at the top of my lungs just as the door in front of me slammed shut and the train began to move out of the station.


	2. Surprise!

I was going to kill Dorcas, well and truly kill her. She had made it her life mission to get me and James to hook up. In her eyes the two of us were meant for each other. I was willing to bet she would mention it in job interviews, it would be the highlight of her entire life.

I mean, the man had a very beautiful ass, but I wouldn't go so far as to say he was my soulmate.

Not only was I going to have to keep an eye out for whatever passive aggressive comments came from Petunia but now I was going to have to keep a look out for whatever Dorcas had planned. They didn't train you for this kind of stuff in Defense Against the Dark Arts.

But first I had to find somewhere to hide, preferably where Amos Diggory couldn't see me.

While I had been yelling at Dorcas from the doorway, the man had practically stuck himself to his compartment window and stared at me the entire time. If there was one person who I was more determined to not end up with than James, it would be Diggory.

The man was nice enough I supposed, but every conversation I had with him made me want to light myself on fire. It was always about what Diggory ate, or his struggle to pick out which robes to wear in the morning -which didn't even make sense because we all wore a uniform- or what dinner his family was having and on and on. He never seemed to pick up on the fact that I didn't care.

Not even when I told him that I didn't care to his face.

I scowled at Diggory, gave my trunk a good kick to get it onto its wheels and hurried past his compartment. I desperately searched for a compartment that had people I could get along with for the train ride. If I sat somewhere that was empty Diggory would for sure come and find me and then I'd have to put up with him.

Oh the horror.

I wandered up and down the train cart looking for people I knew. Unfortunately for me, there was no one around, or at least no one that I was willing to spend the entire train ride in the company of.

So yeah, I ended up locked in the Prefect meeting room. It was a nice place to read a book silence, or do your homework, or like I did for most of the ride, take a nap.

It was a glorious nap. I didn't get to sleep a full eight hours all that much, but for once I slept like a baby knowing that I didn't have any responsibilities to take care of.

When I finally stepped off at King's Cross, platform 9 ¾ was full of families embracing each other happily, a colourful crowd of robes and witches hats and animals screaming in their cages. It was like doing an obstacle course as I wove through everyone on my way to the exit. Petunia would be irritated the entire ride home if I made her wait too long as I had learned all too well throughout the years.

In the sea of colours there was one dark spot that drew attention from everyone. I caught a glimpse of Regulus, Sirius's brother, stepping off of the Hogwarts Express. He had a blank expression on his face as he was greeted by a tall, severe looking woman with black hair, and an equally tall man whose hair was as long as Sirius's but tied back. Neither parent rushed forward to hug their son, they weren't even trying to touch each other let alone their son. Regulus bowed to them formally, to which they nodded and then turned their back on him. A small house elf stepped forward and grabbed Regulus by the hand and that's when I saw Regulus finally smile.

Petunia may have been a nightmare to live with but I could say with a fair amount of confidence that she wasn't as bad as the Black family seemed to be.

When I stepped through the barrier the first thing my eyes landed on was Petunia who was standing five metres away from the wall, the edges of her mouth pulling downwards in disapproval. Her blonde hair had been curled, half of it in a ponytail with a scarf tied like a headband. She was still tall and as skinny as ever. And very much up the ass of every single fashion magazine in existence judging by her outfit.

I gave a sigh and prepared myself for her. It was exhausting to be around Petunia, not that I paid much attention to her sniping these days, but every once in a while I'd have a bad day and her snide comments would be the straw that broke the camel's back.

"You certainly took your time," Petunia snapped when I was within hearing distance. I clenched my jaw and told myself to behave because mum wouldn't be happy if I ran her eldest daughter over with the car.

"The platform was full, it's kind of hard to navigate around everyone," I ground out as pleasantly as I could. Petunia simply sniffed, her nose in the air, spun on her heel and marched away from me.

"Thanks for offering to help with my stuff," I muttered under my breath.

"At least _your people_ coming through the barrier are dressed normal instead of those ugly dresses you all wear," Petunia called over her shoulder as she walked ahead of me, her handbag swinging from her arm. They're robes but whatever.

"That's because they're muggleborns, everyone else just Apparates from the station," I informed her as politely as I possibly could. It had been seven years, why Petunia continued to act like she didn't know anything about my world was beyond me. She acted as if magic was contagious, and believe me, if it was, our relationship wouldn't be hanging by a thread.

We walked in silence, her in front and me following behind, like always.

Petunia led us to our old family car. She unlocked the doors, didn't bother helping me get my things into the car and instead took her seat as the driver. I worked as fast as possible to shove my trunk into the back seat and hurried into my own seat before Petunia could leave without me. I stared out the window at the world around me and left Petunia to her driving.

Muggle London was always bustling, full of people rushing to wherever they needed to go, someone always on a street corner trying to sell you something, children crying. It was its own kind of magic in a way, but maybe it was because I spent all of my time in the wizarding community, but it no longer felt interesting to me. It no longer felt like something I was a part of, it was stranger now to see people not using magic, or owls swooping over people's head as they delivered their post.

And in just a few months, after I was out of Hogwarts, I would be choosing to leave it behind. Maybe once I finished Hogwarts, Petunia would allow me into her good graces again, maybe she'd think I would go back to normal. You'd think that after all of these years I would've stopped trying to gain her approval.

I gave a sigh and forced the thoughts out of my mind, this was the kind of thinking I saved when exams came around. This wasn't what I wanted to think about on my winter vacation, it was bad enough I was going to have to put up with Petunia's constant commentary, I wasn't about to mope around thinking about what I was going to do after Hogwarts.

Petunia gave the steering wheel a sharp yank that sent me flying towards her. I gripped my seatbelt tightly as she straightened the car, cursing about terrible drivers. I had several comments ready to make but decided to keep them to myself in the hopes that she wouldn't push me out of the car while she was driving.

We eventually pulled up in front of our house with Petunia stomping on the breaks right before she drove into the kitchen. She threw open the door and hurried into the house, leaving me to take my stuff out of the car.

The minute I stepped indoors I was assaulted by mum.

"Oh sweetie, I've missed you so much!" mum cried, squeezing the breath out of me. I gasped when she released me from her stranglehold and planted a kiss on her cheek.

"Hi mum," I replied with a grin and threw my arm across her shoulders. She led us towards the kitchen where my dad was cooking lunch in his favourite frilly apron.

"Hello darling," my dad greeted me, turning his head over his left shoulder as he continued stirring sauce. "Did you have a good trip back?"

"I had to hide in the Prefects meeting room to avoid a boy, but other than that it was fine," I replied, taking a seat next to Petunia who moved her tub of ice cream away from me, at the kitchen table.

"It's not that Potter boy you've told us so much about is it?" mum asked, the corners of her mouth twitching upwards. The apple that was on its way to my mouth paused halfway as I watched her and dad exchange a look that I could only describe as if they knew something. I looked over at Petunia who simply rolled her eyes but said nothing.

"No, not this time around, it's this boy named Diggory, he's even worse than Black," I said.

"Is Black the Potter boys friend?" Dad asked. He wiped his hands on his apron and turned the stove off. I nodded in agreement.

"Now that I think about it, James hasn't been irritating for a really long time," I added, frowning as I tried to think of instances where I was annoyed by James. There was the time he annoyed me by having all of the answers I needed for a Charms assignment, and the time he annoyed me by playing exceptionally well during one of the Quidditch matches. Not to mention it was beyond irritating how he knew what to say at the right moments all the time.

"Yes, people change over time, what a shocking concept," mum replied sarcastically. I stuck my tongue out at her in response and kept chewing on my apple. "Petunia are you packed for tomorrow?"

"... Yes," mum narrowed her eyes at Petunia. Petunia tried to keep eye contact as long as she could but I swore I could see sweat starting to bead at her hairline.

"So I'll take that as a no then?" mum replied with a raised eyebrow.

"Ugh, it won't even take that long, and even if I don't finish, Lily can just use freak powers to pack it all into my trunk," Petunia whined. Sometimes it really was shocking that this woman was older than me what with the way that she behaved. She slammed the lid on her tub of ice cream, aggressively threw it into the freezer and exited the kitchen with an aggravated growl.

"I'm not seventeen yet so no I can't!" I hollered after her. All I got was her bedroom door slamming shut in response. I couldn't help but giggle at her antics.

"So where exactly are we going for our winter break?" I asked mum. Dad spooned spaghetti onto a plate and poured his sauce over it. He slid the plate over to me with a grin.

"Oh, your friend Dorcas heard that we were going away and she said that her family has this cottage that they're not using and asked if we would like to use it. We told her we couldn't possibly, but she absolutely insisted, said something about the universe wanting it that way. Well, we couldn't refuse, it sounded great," mum replied. Her head was stuck in the fridge looking for some juice. I snuck past her butt and opened the drawer next to the kitchen sink looking for a fork.

"Really, Dorcas? I didn't even know that Dorcas had a vacation cottage, let alone that her family used it," I said with a raised eyebrow. I forked some spaghetti to my mouth and hummed in appreciation at the taste.

"Didn't you know that they had some sort of vacation cottage, as close as you two are, I thought she would've mentioned it for sure?," mum asked. "What kind of juice do you want sweetie?"

"Cranberry, and no I had no idea that Dorcas had a second house. At all."

"Well, anyways, it's absolutely lovely that they're letting us use it since they won't be there this year!" mum exclaimed. She put down a glass of cranberry juice next to my plate and ruffled my hair. She joined my dad at the sink and the two of them started doing the dishes together.

"Yeah … great," I mumbled. I knew Dorcas was stinking rich, but I hadn't realized she was rich enough to own an entire second house. And it just sat around waiting for everyone to come around for holidays every year. I wondered what she would have told her parents she needed it for. This entire trip was starting to stink the more and more I heard about it.

What if Dorcas was acting when she told me she was disappointed I was leaving for holidays? What if she had hijacked my winter vacation and was the reason I had to leave Hogwarts this year? This seemed exactly like something Dorcas would do. The only question was, how exactly did James Potter of all people fit into this?

I handed my finished plate to my dad, and absentmindedly planted a kiss on his cheek and mums. "I'm gonna go see if Dorcas has sent any letters since I left." I rushed out of the kitchen, banging my hip painfully into the corner of the wall in my hurry, and sprinted up the stairs to my room.

I rushed to the window and stuck my head outside looking for any circling owls but didn't see any. I was actually going to kill her.

The rest of the day was spent listening to various bangs coming from Petunia's room as she threw shoes and who knew what else around her room in frustration. The easy atmosphere around the house was occasionally punctuated by a muffled yell that came from her behind her muffled door of, "I HAVE NOTHING TO _WEAR!_ "

Mum and dad acted like they couldn't hear her existential crisis coming from her room and I followed suit. Mostly because I knew that if I tried to help at all, Petunia would have an even bigger meltdown than the ongoing one she was currently in the middle of. As far as Petunia was concerned, I knew nothing about fashion, couldn't tell navy apart from black, and could pass for a twelve-year-old boy most of the time. Or, God forbid, I contaminated her clothing with my Satan powers or some shit. I'd hate for her to break a heel by chucking it at my head.

Dinner passed well enough, Petunia acted as if I wasn't even present and ignored every question I asked. She went on and on and on and _on_ about Vernon, a man I had only met once and had already decided that I disliked him. She must've been really serious about him to tell him that I could do magic.

At least I assumed she had told him, that was the only explanation why he greeted me with, "Oh, so _you're_ the abnormal one."

First of all, who the hell even greets someone like that, what kind of _bullshit_? Second of all, I didn't understand why he was looking down on me, at least there was something interesting about me. The only thing worth noting about Vernon was his incredibly ugly, stomach churning mustache. How on earth Petunia could stand to kiss someone with something that hairy over their top lip, I would never know. One of these days I was going to shave it off in the middle of the night and then she was really going to disown me.

I won't lie, I zoned out for pretty much all of Petunia's spiel about him. All I knew was he had gotten some sort of promotion at work (as far as I could tell, the reward for doing boring work well was getting promoted to do -wait for it- even more boring work). It was something to do with drills, no one really knew what it was and we'd been hearing about it for two years now.

Petunia shot me smug looks the entire time she talked about Vernon, unfortunately for her I didn't give a shit.

That night I fell asleep to the dulcet sounds of Petunia's continued panic at what she should pack for the trip. Morning came bright and early and so goddamn cold I didn't want to get out of bed. But drag myself out of bed I did, my hair tangled and a bird's nest on top of my head. My breath smelled disgusting I almost passed out from the brief whiff I got of it.

I had to get to the bathroom before Petunia did otherwise I'd never get washed. She spent almost two hours in there literally everyday. She didn't even come out looking any different than she did when she woke up.

By the time Petunia managed to drag her way out of her room, a scowl etched onto her face (as usual), I was already washed and dressed in my baggiest sweater and my favourite jeans. I skipped down the stairs as Petunia slammed the bathroom door shut hard enough to shake the walls on the second floor.

I was waiting for the day when she left some sort of scratch on mums cream coloured walls and all hell broke loose.

Mum and dad had all of our stuff ready by the door, dad was slowly packing them into the back of our car while mum checked off the things that she had packed for the fifth time probably to make sure she hadn't forgotten anything. I grabbed a bowl and poured myself cereal, which I ate so fast I might as well have inhaled it.

Once I had rinsed my bowl, I grabbed what was left of our bags and dragged them out to the car, mum still had her head buried in her purse counting off the last of the things in her list. Mum hollered for Petunia to hurry the hell up, and after another five minutes, Petunia finally graced us with her presence and wafted down the stairs, her nose stuck in the air, her blonde hair pulled into a painful looking ponytail. I rolled my eyes and crawled into the left side of the back seat of the car.

Petunia slid in on the other side as if she was the Queen herself and very obviously turned her back on me. I rolled my eyes at her and turned towards my own window. With a cheery, "Here we go!" from my mum, we were off.

It turned out to be an incredibly long ride, I thought any second we were going to drive out of England and into Ireland or back to Scotland. The city and its noise faded into the distance as we drove, replaced by fields and forests. The amount of snow that was on the ground increased the closer we got to the mountains until eventually everywhere I looked, snow was all I could see.

Petunia and I said absolutely nothing the entire ride, which was just as well, it was better than bickering with her the entire ride.

"We'll be there soon girls," mum said, turning around in her seat to flash us an excited grin. Her dark blonde hair had been pulled into a bun on top of her head, her lack of makeup making her look much younger than she was. Dad patted her hand fondly and held onto it in response.

"Mum, not to alarm you, but it kind of seems like we're driving towards the middle of nowhere," I said, looking out the window where indeed, you really couldn't see much of anything except for bare trees and even more bare trees. I couldn't even remember how long it had been since we'd seen a petrol station.

"Well, it's actually in a very secluded spot, is what I heard, so I guess in a sense, it is in the middle of nowhere," mum replied excitedly. I raised an eyebrow at her skeptically. The lack of details that I was given about this trip was making it seem as if Dorcas had set us up for a homicide instead of a vacation.

"And if something happens, how exactly are we going to get to civilization to ask for help?" I asked her.

"Oh, Dorcas said to just owl her if anything went wrong," my mum replied offhandedly. I hated to inform my mum that in the event of an emergency, Dorcas was the very last person you wanted to owl. "She also mentioned that we would have one neighbour nearby, apparently the family goes to the house every year, she said they should be able to assist us if anything goes wrong."

What did that mean? Did that mean that they were wizards? Were they doctors? Maybe they were Healers? Park Rangers? Secret agents from the government? Veterinarians? WHAT DID THAT MEAN? Maybe they were just experts in dealing with disasters.

"She also said the couple had two of their own children, one biological son, and one recently adopted son," mum went on. My palms started sweating and my heart began to pound. That sounded an awful lot like someone I knew. Someone who I had spent the first semester working very closely.

It sounded an awful lot like James Potter.

Suddenly my idea that Dorcas had orchestrated this entire winter vacation was starting to seem a lot less far-fetched and a lot more real. After this many years and I was still surprised at the lengths that this woman went to to get her way.

It couldn't possibly be James Potter. Not that I had anything against the guy anymore, contrary to what I told Dorcas, I did in fact have a very difficult time of keeping my eyes off of James's arse (have I mentioned this already?). And I did laugh a little too hard at the jokes that he made. Oh God, Sirius would be giving me this _look_ the entire time that I was around them.

I was barely surviving his charm and wit as it was, how was I supposed to just remain friends with him when I was exposed to it this whole time? All of that calm that I had maintained while Dorcas escorted me to the station had been an act. James Potter had a habit of making me incredibly nervous quite a bit of the time, like now.

And how I could possibly forget: Petunia would lose her damn mind that they were wizards. It would make being in the same house with her an absolute nightmare.

I was going to _kill_ Dorcas.

It just couldn't be James. It just couldn't, and it wouldn't be him because I had made the executive decision that it wasn't possible.

But that didn't stop me from fidgeting the rest of the ride, I kept crossing and uncrossing my legs, my knees kept jiggling up and down, my hands wouldn't stop tapping out rhythms on my thighs, and I couldn't keep my mind focused on any thought for longer than a few seconds. It eventually caught Petunia's attention, who narrowed her eyes and finally deigned to say something to me.

"You know who it is, don't you?" she hissed at me quietly. She had gone as far as stretching across the back seat to get closer to me so our parents wouldn't hear. I focused on a spot on the road ahead of us and kept jiggling my leg.

"I have an idea of who it might be, but I'm very much hoping and praying that I'm really wrong," I whispered to her nervously.

"Who do you think it is?" she hissed, pinching me hard on my arm. I almost gave a yelp but she slapped her hand over my mouth to muffle the sound.

"All I'm saying is that, if you don't like me, then you're going to hate whoever I think it is," I told her.

As it turned out, the world, and Dorcas, did in fact, hate me.

By the time we finally arrived to the house, it was dark out, and everyone was tired. It was very evident that Dorcas had understated where her family went for winter holidays. It was just a little bit bigger than a cabin.

It was a mansion.

A very big, very dark, mansion with far too many windows and what looked like at the very least, three floors. There was a driveway leading up to the front door, and a large fountain in front of the steps leading to the front door that wasn't in use. The outside walls gleamed in the dark, made from some shiny brick-like material that I had never laid eyes on. Tall, Romanesque pillars stood on either side of the dark-panelled door. I was expecting a house-elf to open the door any second, which would no doubt send Petunia into hysterical shrieking and cursing.

We all spent a good five minutes ogling at the place we would be staying in.

"Hot damn," Petunia breathed. That's what broke the trance and got us to pop open the trunk of the car and start pulling all of our shit out. Mum dug out a key from her pocket to insert into a keyhole that I had no doubt was only recently added to the door.

She unlocked the door with a loud click and pushed it open. The house was dead silent when we crept inside. The lights immediately turned on once we had entered. The floor was white marble, the walls were painted a light beige, there were several paintings on the walls of what I assumed to be previous generations of the Meadowes family.

There was one staircase to our right that went up into the second floor of the house which branched off on either side to what were no doubt bedrooms and guest bedrooms. Right next to the staircase was an entrance to another room and to our left, two doors next to each other that led to who knew where.

There was a coat tree a metre from the doorway, and only two tables, one on the other side of the room, and one to our right near the doorway, each only had a pot of flower with lilies in them. The one nearest to us had several pieces of papers left there.

"Holy shit," I breathed.

"Lily!"

"Sorry, mum."

I walked over to the paper that was left lying around and picked it up. Dorcas had left us all maps. There were floor designs for each floor of the house, which did indeed have three floors.

"Oh, how lovely of them to make little maps for us," mum said, pointing to the 'You are here,' dot, "isn't this cute?"

"Adorable," I grumbled.

"Alright well, let's take our things upstairs and then we can go and greet our neighbours," mum said, clapping her hands together and heading for the door.

"Mum, shouldn't we wait until tomorrow, I mean, it's awfully dark out, maybe they don't even want guests, we shouldn't disturb them," I called as I chased after her. I let out a shriek as I slipped and slid towards the front door, my sneakers leaving wet marks on the floor as I went skidding across the room.

"Nonsense, it's not evening yet, we'll go introduce ourselves, maybe stay for a cup of tea if they invite us, and then be on our way," she said. She checked to make sure the car was locked and then went back inside the house with me trailing behind her like a kicked puppy the entire time.

Petunia and I grunted as we dragged our trunks up the stairs to the second floor. I hadn't even bothered unpacking mine when I had arrived from the train station so it was full of lots of things that I probably didn't need.

Petunia went left and I decided to head right, maybe if we stayed in completely different areas inside the house it would minimize our chances of fighting. But if I knew my sister, and trust me, I did, she would come looking for a fight even if I did nothing to piss her off.

I chose the first door that I came across. I turned the handle on the dark brown door and pushed it open with enough force that it banged off the wall.

It was a lovely room, the walls were a pale yellow, the large bed in the middle of the room had a mattress that looked like it would swallow me whole in comfort the minute I laid down on it. The comforter was striped with yellow and white. There was a dresser with four drawers that was painted white, and a nightstand next to the bed with a small lamp that turned on the minute I stepped into the room.

There was a large window directly across from me that looked out onto the front of house where the fountain was, white flowy drapes hung in front of the window. There was a door that no doubt led to a bathroom to my left, and a dark brown wardrobe right next to it with a body length mirror nearby.

I dragged my trunk right in front of the wardrobe and left it there for me to unpack later. I took a running start and threw myself onto the bed. The dozen pillows that were on it flew into the air and landed on the floor in soft thumps.

The mattress was absolute heaven. I could have fallen asleep right there and then I was so comfy. I was starting to drift off when Petunia's voice hit me like the lash of a hunting crop.

"LILY, MUM SAID TO HURRY UP WE HAVE TO GO!"

With a sigh and a mournful, "I'll miss you," to my new bed, I left my room. Instead of taking the stairs down, I had the genius idea of hopping on the banister and riding it all the way down. Petunia was waiting at the bottom for me with a disapproving look.

My parents had linked arms and were grinning as if Christmas had come early. As soon as Petunia and I had locked the door, the two of them were off speed walking through the snow. I trudged after them as if I was being led to my own funeral back down the driveway and out the large front gates.

After only a few minutes of walking, my feet were freezing and I couldn't feel my toes. The snow was slowly seeping in through the fabric of my shoes and the heat making its way through my soles until I was ready to just cut my ankles off and be done with the whole ordeal.

I kept pulling my hat down because the wind kept blowing it higher and higher on my head, my scarf kept slapping me in the face, and I was altogether miserable. What pissed me off was that James was such a genuinely nice person it was impossible to hate him now.

Honestly fuck him for doing this to me.

If I hadn't been in such a woe is me mood, I might have noticed how quiet it was in the woods as we walked through them. Or how pretty the scenery was with the trees all lined up the way that they were, reaching towards the sky in the night. I might have even been scared that a bear was going to come along and eat us.

After walking for ten minutes, the mansion next door finally came into view. Whichever family that lived here (that was not the Potters') didn't seem to prescribe to the same grandiosity that Dorcas's parents did. They still had a mansion, but it was decidedly smaller than Dorcas's house, and was missing the large iron gates and the long driveway with a fountain at the end of it.

Ugh, even his house was modest, this was disgusting.

The closer we got to the house, the more the sense of dread grew in my stomach, I started to sweat, which of course only made me colder which was exactly what I was going for. It seemed like forever until we had reached the front door. I felt as if I was going to throw up and Petunia's heavy perfume wasn't helping.

"Lils, are you alright darling?' dad asked, eyebrows furrowed in concern, one hand on my shoulder. "You're positively green sweetheart."

"I'm fine, just a little nervous," I replied stiffly and took in a big gulp of fresh air. I was too busy trying to not pass out to notice much about the mansion I was standing in front of. But judging by the O Petunia's mouth was forming, it was as impressive as Dorcas's mansion.

My parents rang the doorbell, which was loud enough to be heard throughout the house. There was a few seconds pause and then the door swung open as if on its own. My parents and Petunia were staring straight ahead, but I knew to look down, and there stood a house-elf.

"Hello there," I said with a smile. I reached out to shake the house-elf's hand when Petunia let out an unholy shriek and scared the poor thing half to death. The house-elf looked between me and Petunia, eyes wide in fear.

"Are you okay, miss?" the house-elf asked.

"She'll be fine, she's just never seen a house-elf before," I replied, my parents moved aside to allow me to step closer.

The house-elf held the door open wider and gestured with her hand that we should come in. My parents and Petunia shuffled in behind me, still staring at the house-elf with wonder etched on their faces. I barely had time to take in the staircase, the large chandelier in the middle of the room, and the moving photographs of the Potter family on various trips that surrounded the walls of the room we had just entered before Willa started speaking again.

"I am Willa, Mistress will be here to greet you any moment," Willa squeaked and bowed to us. As if on cue, a tall woman, quite a few years older than my parents judging from the lines on her face, but with no gray in sight in her jet black hair. She smiled warmly towards my parents and shook their hands.

"Welcome, you must be the ones staying in the Meadowes' house this year. They told us you were already very familiar with the wizarding world so we felt it would be okay to leave all of our eccentricities as is," she said. She reached for Petunia, who tried her best to hide her grimace and held the woman's hand as if it was scalding and quickly let go. If the woman was offended, she didn't show it. She turned towards me and I rushed forward to shake her hand.

"My name is Euphemia, it's lovely to meet you all, my husband Fleamont will be along in just a minute," she said and I couldn't help but grin up at her. There was a twinkle in her eye that I liked, her hair was long and a nest around her with curls that were all tangled together and messy. I couldn't put my finger on what it was about her that made me instantly like her, but like her I did.

As soon as my parents had introduced themselves, a man, equally as tall as Euphemia and just as old entered the room and I could've sworn the room got warmer. He had dark green eyes in contrast to his wifes warm brown ones.

And he had James's head of hair. Fuck.

He shook everyone's hands enthusiastically and seemed especially excited to meet me. He took one look at my hair and my eyes and a knowing grin lit his face. Oh wow was I going to murder James Potter for whatever stories he had fed his parents about me. My hit list just kept getting longer and longer.

"Pleasure to meet you all, I'm Fleamont," Fleamont said to us all, wrapping an arm around his wife. "Dear, where are the boys?"

I was ready to combust into flames.

"Oh I forgot, they're somewhere in the house working on something. I just hope nothing catches fire," she added with a wink. She walked over to the staircase and yelled, "BOYS! COME DOWNSTAIRS! GUESTS!"

There was a sudden increase of commotion coming from the second floor. There was the thumping of feet as they got closer and closer to the stairs and a sudden burst of yelling and laughter.

First came Sirius, black hair whipping around him, grin spread across his model face (I hated that this man was so beautiful), grey eyes twinkling with mirth. And then a voice that I would know was James hollering at him.

"SIRIUS GIVE ME THE BLOODY SHIRT BACK I CAN'T GREET GUESTS LIKE THIS!" James came into view, shirtless but pants still on thankfully.

The two of them made it to the last step bickering and dodging around each other. As a side note, James Potter looks really fucking good wearing jeans. I really had to stop staring at his ass (you know, I really think I have mentioned his ass before).

"BOYS!" Euphemia yelled louder than both of them, effectively silencing the two. They stopped and stared at her wide-eyed, and at the tilt of her head, turned towards me and my family.

Sirius and James looked over my parents and my sister before zeroing in on me. I could literally see when it clicked for both of them that I was there. Their eyes widened, and their faces split apart into equal, matching grins. I'd never seen two people so excited to see me before in my life. There was a beat of silence and then,

"LILY!" they both thundered and bolted towards me. The last thing I saw before their arms engulfed me and blocked out the world was James's parents trying not to burst into laughter.

* * *

 **a/n:** hello i'm here with chapter 2 and i was really pleasantly surprised with the amount of responses that i got in chapter 1. thank you to everyone who read and reviewed and stuff. let me know your thoughts on this chapter and i'll see y'all next time.

thank you to fugacity7 for pointing out my queue/cue boo boo i fixed it now let me know if y'all spot any other mistakes.


	3. The Potters

James Potter was a very warm person, he had, as it turned out, incredibly soft skin and by Merlin did he smell amazing. I knew this because I was being crushed into his chest while Sirius attempted to break my spine from behind me. In fact, James smelled so good that I really thought I was going to start drooling on him at any moment, either that or faint from how nice it felt to be pressed up against him.

Even in the occasional daydream that I'd had about James never did I ever imagine myself as being in a position where I would be pressed up against his shirtless torso.

"LILY. LILY. LILY. LILY," they both chanted as they bobbed up and down with their arms still caging me in against James's chest. Absolutely lovely, not only did my sister hate wizards, but now she probably thought we were all Satanists as well.

Mrs. Potter clapped her hands twice, loud enough that it completely drowned out James and Sirius. The effect of her clap left me speechless, not only did James and Sirius _shut up_ but they let go of me and gave me room to breathe. Although, if I was being honest, suffocation by being pressed up against James for too long was a death I would accept without protest.

"Let the poor girl breathe, boys," Euphemia said scoldingly. She wasn't fooling me though, I spent enough time with James to be able to spot the twitch at the corners of her mouth as she attempted to prevent herself from laughing. I seriously doubted the woman had ever given a proper scolding to either James or Sirius in their entire lives.

"Yes mum," they replied in unison, matching grins spread across their faces. My own parents seemed to be torn somewhere between concern, and amusement at the flamboyant display of affection towards me. Petunia looked absolutely disgusted and I was willing to bet she was ready to hurl all over the Potters' lovely floor.

"Mum, dad, this is James and Sirius," I said, pointing to each of them in turn. James kept lunging at Sirius over my head as he tried to snatch back his shirt. Sirius kept darting back, a smile spread across his face in glee. James thrust out an arm in front of me in an attempt to grab at Sirius. Sirius thrust his right arm as far away from his body as possible and actually giggled. My own response to the shenanigans of those was what truly concerned me. I bent around all of James's actions without batting an eyelash. I was beginning to think I spent maybe a little bit too much time around those two if I could anticipate all of their movements.

I could practically hear Dorcas smugly telling me, "I told you so," in my head. The urge to lightly punch her in the face increased.

"They're, uh, they're …." I trailed off as I tried to think of an appropriate term to use to describe the boys. Were we close enough to be considered friends? Did they even consider me their friend?

"We're Lily's bestest friends," Sirius interrupted as he flung the shirt he was holding at James's head. Without missing a beat, he took a couple of large strides towards my parents and grasped my dad's hand firmly in his own, a parent-friendly grin pasted on his face. Dad seemed charmed although I could see it in his face that he was trying his damndest to be suspicious of Sirius, especially because Sirius looked like the type of man that parents typically didn't want their daughters around. I could see one of Sirius's many tattoos poking out of the sleeve of his shirt, his long hair, framing his face stylishly.

The man could have been a model for a shampoo commercial and it absolutely pissed me off every single time I was hit with this realization. How dare he be this beautiful without even trying.

Mum completely ignored the outstretched hand that Sirius held towards her and gathered him into one of her special hugs that she saved only for those that she approved of. Had this immediate approval come from anyone else, I would've seriously questioned their judgement, but mum was a disturbingly good judge of character.

She knew Snape was a piece of shit before I did.

James had finally managed to get his shirt on and sent a wink my way when we made eye contact after I managed to tear my gaze away from Sirius and my mum. I could feel my face heating up and was hoping that James wouldn't notice even though on the rare occasion that I did blush I turned a shade of sunburnt red.

Unfortunately for me, James was a lot more observant than I gave him credit for and looked absolutely delighted at the unbecoming shade that I had turned.

James darted forward to introduce himself to my parents enthusiastically as Sirius attempted to grasp Petunia's hand for a handshake even though she had offered him only a finger and a half in greeting. James practically threw himself around my dad's neck and then threw himself at my mum before my dad could gather his wits to form a response.

The highlight of his greeting was when James yanked Petunia into a hug before she had time to react and gave her a good squeeze as Sirius shot my sister a dirty look from the side. And as dead inside as Petunia was, even I could tell that she had trouble resisting James, especially when he smelled as nice as he did and radiated as much heat as he did.

Fleamont and Euphemia had both leaned down and were talking quietly to Willa, who nodded solemnly at everything they said before disappearing with a light pop.

"Do take off your coats and come in for some tea," Euphemia said graciously as Fleamont made his way into what I assumed was one of their guest rooms. Their house was big enough to have at least seven. My parents looked around for a coat tree expectantly and shot Euphemia looks of confusion at a lack of place of them to leave their belongings.

Euphemia seemed to realize this and let out a chuckle, "Oh, I'm so sorry, I forgot," she said and snapped her fingers. The large oval mirror that had been hung up next to the door removed itself from the wall and elongated itself until it was the same height as my dad and turned to wood.

While my parents stared open mouthed at the newly transfigured coat tree, I couldn't take my eyes off of Euphemia who acted as if nothing out of the ordinary had just happened even though she had just performed wandless and wordless magic right before my very fucking eyes.

James's mother was so _cool_. I barely even noticed myself taking off my scarf and coat while I ogled Euphemia. My belongings floated away from me and hung themselves on the coat tree.

"You okay there, Lils?" James asked quietly in my ear. I jumped a foot in the air at the sound of his voice. I hadn't seen him take his spot next to me again. There was also the fact that the sound of James's deep voice right next to my ear did things to me that I would rather not feel with my parents and my snitch of a sister around.

"Your mom just did wandless and silent magic,"I hissed at him as my parents and Petunia shuffled after Euphemia, her loud graceful voice drifting towards as she entertained my parents with a story. Sirius had hung back to walk with James and I. He threw his arm around my shoulders and pulled me right under his armpit and tugged me forward. I looked up into Sirius's face and caught the fleeting smug look that he threw at James.

Why couldn't I have the good luck of being near James's armpit right now instead of Sirius. God I wished that smug look Sirius sent was to rub it in James's face that he was the one with his arm around me.

Maybe I needed to calm down.

"I'll give you a hint, she's charmed that tree to respond to her finger snapping to transfigure all so she can impress the guests. It's just part of being a Potter," Sirius said grandly. "Amass a large fortune through hair gel, pay their house-elves, you name it."

I tried to turn my head towards my left to look at James who looked a bit sheepish at the mention of hair gel.

"What hair gel?" I managed to choke out as Sirius's arm dug into my throat, effectively choking me as I walked.

"My dad's the one who invented Sleekeazy's," James replied, shoving a hand into his messy, black hair.

"Wow, your dad invents a whole new kind of hair gel and it still can't tame your hair," I replied and gave into Sirius's iron grip on me. I threw my right arm around his waist for a firm grip and laid my head against his side. There were worst positions to be in than clamped to Sirius Black's side I supposed.

The room we entered was bigger than the entrance and I was delighted to see that every corner of this room had been fitted with bookshelves and filled to the brim with books. My mouth dropped open as I saw shelf upon shelf of books. There were different sizes across different ages, some looked as if they were ready to crumble apart at the slightest breeze and others looked as if they weighed more than I did.

Some were laid open on stands and I caught glimpses of the intricate drawings that were on the pages as they reflected light from the candles that were lit around the room floating in various corners. I could feel my hands itching to go over and flip through them. Maybe it shouldn't have surprised me that the Potters had so many books in their house. Just because I had gone through the years under the impression that James and Sirius couldn't read didn't mean their parents didn't know how.

There was a large window immediately to my left that looked out on the front of the house with large, squishy armchairs set next to it. Ahead of me there was a giant fireplace that was crackling away and several couches and armchairs set up around the roaring fire.

James's parents had already taken their seats and had cups of tea in their hands. My parents had made themselves at home on the couch as they looked around them, eyebrows raised in delight. Petunia, being the easygoing, adaptable person that she was, was sitting on the edge of a comfortable looking armchair, hands clasped in her lap, her back ramrod straight.

Of course, Petunia zeroed in on me and Sirius and narrowed her eyes at us. But before I could think too hard about how this could come across to my parents and remove myself from Sirius's side, they had already turned around and seen us. But if I thought my parents were going to become annoyingly overprotective and nosy, I was very wrong when all they did upon catching sight of me was blink and then turn back to James's parents.

Nevertheless James took this opportunity to throw his other arm around me and tugged me towards him. My free arm immediately came up and wrapped itself around his waist and held him to me as tightly as possible. It would surprise no one to know that my grip on James was considerably tighter than my grip on Sirius.

Then again, Sirius wasn't the one with the arse that I wrote poetry about.

The three of us carefully arranged ourselves in front of one of the couches and fell back into it at the same time, arms still locked around each other.

"It's so good to finally meet you, Lily," Euphemia said as she looked between me and James. Fleamont kept looking at his wife, a knowing look on his face which made me nervous because if that look meant the same thing it meant on James then I'd have to be prepared for whatever came my way.

"Gosh, that makes it sound like James has already told you all about me," I said, grinning in return. I couldn't help myself, the muscles in my face absolutely refused to stop smiling no matter how hard I tried.

"Oh he has, in fact, he can't seem to _stop_ talking about you, dear," Euphemia said. James let out a loud cough next to me.

"Really now," I replied and I'd be lying if I said her words didn't make my stomach clench in excitement.

"Oh yes, I don't think we've had a single letter that hasn't mentioned you or how pretty you are or how smart you are," Euphemia went, completely ignoring her son, who I knew was probably red in the face without even looking at him. I could hear Sirius snorting next to me, his whole body shaking as he tried to keep in his laughter.

Even my parents couldn't keep the looks of amusement off of their faces. I caught the sound of Petunia's annoyed scoff from somewhere around me and ignored her. Unfortunately for me, I couldn't say I had said equally nice things about James to my parents throughout the years.

"And don't even get me started on the painstaking detail he put into describing the ways you've doled out punishment to him as a Prefect," Euphemia added with an airy laugh. I couldn't help but wince at the mention of my previous encounters with James. My interactions with him in fifth year had admittedly been rather aggressive.

"Mum, please, I beg of you, stop," James groaned out and it didn't escape my notice that he chose me to hide behind. There wasn't anywhere else for him to hide his face, but a victory for me nonetheless.

"Just wait until she brings out your baby photos," Fleamont chipped in, biting the inside of his cheek to keep himself from laughing.

"What a brilliant idea dear," Euphemia said as she clapped her hands together in excitement. "I think we'll save that for our second visit though."

"I think I'm going to give Lily and Petunia a grand tour of the house," James barked out loudly and jumped to his feet. I couldn't stop the grimace that came onto my face as James tugged me up after him and I desperately lunged for Sirius. There was no way I was going to suffer through a house tour with Petunia with only James as a buffer between us.

Petunia looked similarly displeased, her face wrinkling up into an expression that suggested something foul had passed right under her nose. This didn't go unnoticed by Sirius but went completely over James's head. He darted towards Petunia and tugged her towards me and Sirius and then quickly ushered all of us out of the room before my parents or his parents could say anything.

I looked to Sirius and found him reflecting back at me the same look that I had on my face, he wasn't very pleased about this turn of events either. Without mum and dad around to make sure she behaved, I wasn't entirely certain that Petunia was even going to pretend to be civilized, let alone indifferent.

James took the stairs two at a time to the second floor and waited for the rest of us to join him as he bounced on the balls of his feet.

"This should take at the very least one hour," James went on as he disappeared down the hallway to his left. I looked at Sirius to make sure that I had heard right but he seemed as nonplussed as James about this statement, as if people regularly took one hour to give a house tour.

"Good God, one hour," Petunia muttered to herself in horror.

James stopped at the first door that we came across and thrust it open grandly, his arm stretched in front of him as he stepped to the side and let us see what was on the inside. It looked like a regular run of the mill guest room with a big bed, a closet, big windows that looked out onto some area of the grounds and a bathroom attached.

"You see it, yes?" James asked and me and Petunia nodded in answer. "Great, you've seen all sixty-two guest rooms, moving on."

I couldn't stop my mouth from dropping open as I followed after James in shock. "Sixty-two guest rooms? Who even needs that many? Why would you possibly have that many people in the house?"

"James's parents throw a New Year's Party every year, a bunch of people show up and they need somewhere to crash after they've had a few too many drinks," Sirius replied as he walked backwards facing me.

"And of course, foreign dignitaries visit, foreign affairs meetings, auror department gatherings," James went on, his arm waving through the air as we moved down the hallway. "The usual things."

"Of course, because we always have foreign dignitaries visiting our house don't we Lily?" Petunia replied drily and I flinched so aggressively at actually being acknowledged that I almost forgot to respond.

"But of course, just last week, you told me the president of Greece was visiting for tea," I deadpanned.

I was momentarily distracted by two girls in a painting, moving from frame to frame as they ran to keep up with the brisk pace we were taking down the hallway. They were waving their parasols, their voices high-pitched as they tried to gain our attention. But James turned a sharp right corner and they disappeared from view.

"And here I thought you didn't have any personality," Sirius remarked towards Petunia. I almost choked on my spit and looked at Petunia with wide eyes.

"Oh how you wound me, I have failed at my sole purpose in life," Petunia replied without missing a beat. The fact that Petunia was even responding with more than a monosyllabic word was a miracle on its own. And the fact that they weren't degrading remarks on top of it? Absolutely mindblowing.

James came to an abrupt stop in front of yet another door and with a light tap of his wand it silently swung open to reveal painting upon painting hanging on the walls. We followed James inside, Petunia and I turning our heads in every direction as we took in the paintings around the room that had people who look very similar to James.

"What is this place?" I asked quietly, my voice echoing back to me. The people in the paintings all stared down at us with interest.

"We're his ancestors of course," barked down one woman who was hung near the ceiling.

"So I take it not every Potter is quite the same breed as you," I said to James.

"No, some of them are bit sharper than others," James said grinning at me. "But same morals and all that."

"They can say some pretty snippy things about my hair whenever I visit them," Sirius replied from where he was making faces at one of the paintings that was making disapproving tsking noises at him. "But they're still nicer than any of the paintings my hag of mother has hanging in her house."

I shot an uneasy look at James. I didn't know much about Sirius's family, he didn't talk about them and I didn't ask. All anyone outside of the Marauders really knew was that Sirius and Regulus didn't talk anymore and Sirius no longer went home to the Blacks. I wasn't entirely sure whether or not I was allowed to comment on anything related to his family.

James mouthed "it's fine" to me and nodded his head, an encouraging smile on his face. Petunia didn't have any similar internal struggle about propriety however.

"What do the portraits say at your house?" she asked as she cautiously approached one painting in a gold frame containing a wizard with long burnt orange robes and the signature Potter hair who had his arm wrapped around a witch with blinding white hair wearing deep blue robes. She lifted a hand and touched the canvas of the painting and watched as the witch and wizard attempted to touch her fingers.

"Well for one thing, there's an absolutely atrocious life-size portrait of dear Walburga, that's her name you see," Sirius said as he moved on to yet another painting that contained a young woman who began to shamelessly flirt with him. "And if that wasn't bad enough, the thing starts screaming absolute murder and filth the minute anyone enters the house."

"Sounds like coming home during the holidays," I muttered as I scowled at one painting with the inhabitants that were laughing at my red hair.

"Just one Walburga wasn't enough for the house, we had to make another one while she was still living," Sirius said airily as he wandered out of the room and disappeared down the corridor. The rest of us quickly followed behind him and James continued leading down the hallway.

James showed us Fleamont's potions room, where Petunia almost blew herself up before I stopped her hand from stirring one of the cauldrons. There were several potions brewing all at once with the cauldrons placed on various surfaces across the room. Some floated near the ceiling, while others rested on bookshelves. When I caught sight of Mr. Potter's potion stores, I could feel my hands itching to just reach out and start mixing ingredients.

James must've seen the look in my eyes or noticed that I was slowly inching towards the shelves because he locked the doors and steered us out of the room. He locked the door and cut me off the cheerful burbling from the cauldrons. Sirius and Petunia had started down the hallway, James and I following behind them at a safe distance.

"If you come back later, maybe you'll get to play around with some of the stuff," James leaned and breathed next to my ear. I barely managed to control the shiver that went down my spine.

"Is that supposed to be a euphemism for something dirty?" I whispered back to him, trying to stop a grin from spreading across my face.

"I'm frankly offended that you would think so lowly of me, Lils. Who do I look like to you, Sirius?" James asked, pressing a hand to his chest as his face twisted into an expression of mock outrage, his mouth hanging open in an O. I couldn't stop myself from smiling at him.

"I'll make sure to be here first thing tomorrow morning," I told him as if my heart wasn't pounding in my chest from the adrenaline pumping through me. When did it suddenly become so hard to remain cool and collected.

Some of the rooms had strange noises coming from behind the closed doors. Some of them sounded disturbingly like screams of agony but I tried not to think about them too much and James made sure to usher us past them as quickly as possible without giving much of an explanation. We went up floors and around corners as James showed us what he could. A few of the rooms that we weren't allowed in was mostly for government purposes, especially since his parents were such important officials in the Auror department.

There was the room of family heirlooms that Petunia looked about ready to lose her mind over. I don't think she even breathed much while she was in the room. She kept her arms firmly crossed and I could see the strain that it was taking on her to keep her hands to herself. It didn't help that Sirius made a joke about some of the objects being cursed if anyone other than the owners touched it.

I myself hadn't found that to be much of a deterrent. With Voldemort running around trying to kill people like me, things couldn't really get any worse than they were. Whatever curse befell me couldn't be any worse than some of the more … enthusiastic Slytherins I had to dodge at Hogwarts. I couldn't help but gravitate towards the tiaras and diadems that were sitting on shelves.

I was drawn to one ring in particular made of gold that had little rubies clustered together. I hadn't even noticed that I'd picked it up and was holding it close to my face until James's shadow fell over me.

"This is lovely," I said to him quietly. I didn't know why I was being quiet, but something about holding that ring and talking to James about it felt oddly intimate.

"I'm glad you like it, it's a probably one of the most important ones here if you ask me," James said, smiling down at me, hands shoved in his pockets.

"What's so special about it, you know, besides the fact that it's old?" I asked, I wasn't even thinking when I slipped it onto the middle finger of my left hand and watched as it sparkled when I twisted my hand. I looked up at James and found him looking back at me with a strange look on his face. It was the same look he got when he was confused and desperately trying to solve a problem.

It's been passed down from generation to generation through the Potter women. My mum got it when she married dad," James replied, strange look still on his face. I slid the ring off my finger and handed it to him, with something that was passed down through generations, it suddenly felt wrong of me to just be trying it on as if I was shopping.

"So it'll go to whoever you marry then, whoever gets this is gonna be one lucky girl," I added without thinking. I barely remembered that Sirius and Petunia were also in the room and probably watching. I just couldn't seem to look away from James.

"I sure hope she feels the same way," James whispered and something about the way he said it and the way he was looking at me made me feel warm inside.

"Oh for Godric's sake, I was joking about the curse you big ninny!" Sirius yelled and I couldn't help but flinch at the loudness of his voice.

"Joke or not, I'm not trying on a bloody _breastplate_ ," Petunia's shrill voice responded.

"Oh come on, what do you think is gonna happen?" Sirius replied and I could just hear the eyeroll in his voice. I leaned to the side and peaked around James's shoulder and watched as Sirius thrust the breastplate towards Petunia again. "The only thing that could possibly happen is you get cursed with a sense of humour."

I couldn't stop the snort that escaped me and quickly averted my gaze when Petunia shot me a glare.

"I think it's time to go," James said, shooting a wink at me before herding us all out of the room and locking it behind him. "There's plenty more to see but I don't think we'll have enough time to show you all of it. Sirius, why don't you take Petunia back downstairs, I have to give Lily something."

Sirius planted his hands on the shoulders of a sputtering Petunia and led her away from James and I with a grin.

"Let's get you back to your parents safe and sound before something in the house gets you," Sirius said cheerfully.

"What do you mean 'gets me?'" Petunia shrieked in a high pitched voice.

"Not to alarm you but some rather aggressive plants were set loose from the greenhouse and we still haven't found them," Sirius replied as he steered Petunia around a corner and the two of them disappeared from sight.

"You guys don't have a greenhouse, do you?" I asked James with a grin. He took my arm and looped it through his and tugged me down the corridor in the opposite direction of Sirius and Petunia.

"Oh we do, but don't worry," James said, giving the hand in the crook of his elbow a pat, "none of the human-eating plants have gotten loose in a very long time."

My feet felt glued to the floor as I gaped at James and almost fell over when he kept walking. I looked into his face to see if he was joking or not but found no indication that he was just messing around with me.

"You're joking right?

"I don't know, am I?"

I tightened my grip on James's arm and stuck myself to his side for the rest of the walk. Joking or not, I wasn't taking any chances. If some plant did suddenly come out of the woodwork to try and eat me I had every intention of sacrificing James so I could escape. This had the added benefit of being able to soak in more of James's body heat, not to mention he smelled a lot better when I was this close.

We went down several flights of stairs and took more turns before James finally stopped in front of a wall made entirely of frosted glass. He took out his wand and tapped it on the handle of the door to the room and gently pushed it open, tugging me in after him.

The door closed gently behind me and I couldn't stop myself from staring around open-mouthed. There were plants and trees everywhere in the room, both magical and non-magical. The room was incredibly warm and I could already feel sweat forming underneath my thick winter sweater. A sweet scent filled the air and I couldn't put my finger on what the exact smell was, I was pretty sure it was all of the plants in the room combined.

I wandered away from James and looked around at everything that spilled onto the stone pathway that I was on. It felt as if all of the plants were reaching out towards me. A lovely haunting sound was a constant background noise as I made my way throughout the room. I hadn't bothered looking back for James but I was fairly certain that he was following me around. Hopefully.

When I followed the stone path around a bend I found the source of the haunting music to be coming from a pair of lovely red and white roses that swayed to a breeze that I couldn't feel.

A few more steps and I finally saw what I assumed James had brought me here for. Facing the large windows that looked out into the empty woods, the Potters had set up seats made of straw with large comfy cushions placed over them. A small table in the middle of all the seats was set up with a teapot and mugs ready for drinking and the entire area had smile piles of books set up around it.

It looked like something straight out of my dreams. I never wanted to leave this place. I just wanted to sit here and drink some hot tea and read some books.

"Wow," I said quietly as I looked around me.

"I thought you might like this," James said. I spun around to face him, my mouth open, eyes wide. His hands were shoved in the pockets of his pants as he swayed backwards and forwards, a satisfied look on his face as he gazed back at me.

"Am I allowed to come back here?" I blurted out.

"Of course, you can come back tomorrow," James replied hopefully. "But for now, I think it's best that we get you back to the rest of your family."

A groan slipped out of me before I could stop myself. It was an unfortunate habit I had developed whenever anything connected to Petunia was mentioned. James couldn't stop grinning as he dragged me out of the solarium and locked it behind him.

"I can't believe I have to go back to Dorcas's house and be around Petunia by myself," I groaned as I followed James down more unfamiliar corridors. The house was so big I had a feeling I could spend my entire life living here and still not have discovered every single nook and cranny.

"Can you believe this time last year you had the same reaction to me and look at us now, the best of buds," James said, one arm slung around my shoulder as the other waved in the air in front of us.

"For the record I didn't hate you, you could be a little bit much at times but I don't think I ever hated you the way that … certain other people hated you," I replied, unwilling to mention Snape's name. The air around us became awkward for a moment before James jumped in.

"That's a nice way of putting it, nah, I was a right piece of shite, don't worry, even I see it now," James said with a grin. "Not that I'm exactly a saint now-"

"Don't I know it," I muttered.

"But growth is all we can ever strive for," James went on as if I hadn't said anything.

"That is the smartest, most self-aware thing I've ever heard leave your mouth," I teased James as we came in view of my parents and Petunia standing at the door with their coats on, all of them waiting for me.

"That's just about the saddest thing I've ever heard about me," James said. My parents barely noticed that I had entered the room, both of them still in deep conversation with the Potters on some topic. James helped me into my coat and took the opportunity to wrap my scarf around my neck and step into my space while he was at it.

I couldn't bring myself to do anything but stare up into his hazel eyes as he wrapped me up. Finally he stepped back with a small sigh and patted me on the head of all things.

"It was lovely meeting you all, hopefully we'll be seeing a lot more of each other these holidays, I can't imagine we'll be able to spend all of our time alone over at the Meadowes mansion," mum said beaming at the Potters who looked equally excited at the prospect of spending time with my family.

"Sirius, darling, please escort the Evans back to their mansion. I'm sure Lily can defend herself just fine, but I wouldn't want to get you into trouble with the Ministry if anything did pop out at you," Euphemia said to Sirius as she threw a wink my way.

Sirius summoned his coat and within minutes we were out of the house and taking the walk back to Dorcas's home.

Sirius couldn't bring himself to behave and kept nudging me every five minutes as he messed with Petunia. He was either freezing the ground underneath her so she'd go slipping and sliding with a high-pitched shriek or moving big sticks in front of her path so that she'd trip over them.

Normally I would've scolded Sirius for his behaviour but because this was Petunia and she gave me constant shit all of the time for being a witch, all I did was grip his arm tightly as I tried to keep in my laughter. Mum and dad bless their souls didn't notice anything out of the ordinary other than to comment on the path becoming seemingly more tricky to navigate despite the fact that it was only Petunia who was suffering.

I think at some point she had probably caught on to what was going on but every time she spun around to glare at Sirius and I, she could never catch Sirius with his wand out.

"How did your _alone time_ with James go?" Sirius asked waggling his eyebrows.

"Did you know the Potters have a solarium?" I asked breathlessly, completely missing what Sirius was hinting at like the dumbass I was.

"That is… exactly what I was getting at," Sirius said dryly.

"Nothing happened, if that's what you were wondering about," I replied with a roll of my eyes. My breath collected in a cloud in front of me when I exhaled and Sirius cast a heating charm on our little party when he noticed the shivering from my shoulders.

"Thank you," I added with a smile as I warmed up. "But James and I are just friends and nothing more."

The mansion came into view and grew closer as we kept walking.

"Uh huh, I'm sure you are Evans," Sirius replied with a roll of his eyes but said nothing more on the topic until the rest of my family was well inside the house before adding, "when are you two going to get your head out of your arses and just get on with it?"

" _Good night_ , Sirius," I replied, leaning on the open front door.

"Love you, Evans," he said and with a wink, Sirius disappeared with a loud crack.

* * *

 **a/n:** hello hello this ended up being extremely long and not much happens but i hope it was enteratining for you nonethless. reviews are always welcome. additionally i'd like to let everyone know that i have a busy semester ahead of me so don't expect much in terms of updates (and if you've stuck by me for a while now then this will come as no surprise) but yeah.


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